drop like flies, to
drop like flies
To succumb to a particular problem, often an illness. This phrase is typically only used when more than one person has been adversely affected. Now that the flu is going through our school, people are dropping like flies.
See also: drop, flies, like
Farlex Dictionary of Idioms.
drop like flies
Fig. to faint, sicken, collapse, or die, in great numbers like houseflies dying in a large group. It was a terrible year for the flu. People were dropping like flies.
See also: drop, flies, like
McGraw-Hill Dictionary of American Idioms and Phrasal Verbs.
drop like flies
Rapidly collapse, die, or drop out, usually referring to a group rather than an individual. For example, The words were so difficult that the spelling bee contestants were dropping like flies. The simile like flies has meant "in large numbers," as it does in this expression, since about 1600.
See also: drop, flies, like
The American Heritage® Dictionary of Idioms by Christine Ammer.
drop like flies, to
To collapse rapidly, referring to a group rather than an individual. Although this term calls to mind flies that are hit with a spray of insecticide and is, in fact, used for human beings subjected to gunfire or an epidemic of disease, like flies has meant in large numbers or quantities since Shakespeare’s time. “The common people swarm like summer flies” wrote the bard (HenryVI, Part 2, 6.8).
See also: drop, like
The Dictionary of Clichés by Christine Ammer
- drop like flies
- drop like ninepins
- go down like ninepins
- go down, drop, etc. like ninepins
- ninepin
- be dropping like flies
- fall like ninepins
- die like flies
- die/drop/fall like flies
- (one's) best foot forward